XL97: Page Fault Copying Shared Formulas and Opening Workbook (168363)


The information in this article applies to:

  • Microsoft Excel 97 for Windows
This article was previously published under Q168363

SYMPTOMS

When you open a workbook in Microsoft Excel 97, you may receive the following error message:
This program has performed an illegal operation and will be shut down.
If the problem persists, contact the program vendor.
If you click Details, you receive an error message similar to either of the following:
EXCEL caused an invalid page fault in module EXCEL.EXE at 0137:30104a84.
EXCEL caused an invalid page fault in module EXCEL.EXE at 0137:3011f337.
When you click Close, Microsoft Excel 97 closes.

CAUSE

This problem may occur if all of the following conditions are true:

  • In the workbook, you copy a range that contains shared formulas. -and-

  • You select a range that contains shared values or shared formulas, click Paste Special on the Edit menu, select an operation (for example, Add, Subtract, Multiply, or Divide), and then click OK. -and-

  • You save, close, and then attempt to reopen the workbook.
For additional information about shared formulas and shared values, see the "More Information" section in this article.

RESOLUTION

To prevent this problem from occurring, do not copy a range of shared formulas and use the Paste Special command to paste the copied formulas into a range that contains shared values or shared formulas.

Note that the problem does not occur if any of the following conditions are true:

  • You copy the values and paste them onto the formulas. The problem occurs only when you paste shared formulas onto shared values or shared formulas.
  • The values or formulas onto which you paste the formulas are not shared. If at least one of the values or formulas is different from the others, the problem does not occur.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in the Microsoft products listed at the beginning of this article.

MORE INFORMATION

If this problem is already occurring, you may not be able to open the workbook. For additional information, please see the following articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

142117 Excel: Summary of Methods to Recover Data from Corrupted Files

147216 Linking to Data in a Damaged File (5.0 and Later)

In Microsoft Excel, if a worksheet contains a sequence of cells that contain formulas or values that follow a distinct pattern, the formulas or values may be shared, for example, if a worksheet contains the following formulas and values: 
   A1: =E1+F1   B1: 1   C1: 1
   A2: =E2+F2   B2: 1   C2: 2
   A3: =E3+F3   B3: 1   C3: 3
   A4: =E4+F4   B4: 1   C4: 4
   A5: =E5+F5   B5: 1   C5: 5
   A6: =E6+F6   B6: 1   C6: 6
Note the pattern in the formulas in column A. Except that row numbers increase by one in each row, each formula is identical to the formula in the row above it. Because of this pattern, the formulas in column A are shared formulas.

Shared values work slightly differently. Because all of the values in column B are identical, they are shared values. Although there is a pattern to the values in column C, they are not shared values because they are different.
Modification Type:MajorLast Reviewed:10/22/2000
Keywords:kberrmsg kbprb KB168363
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